Radio communication devices, information providers, methods for controlling a radio communication device and methods for controlling an information provider

ABSTRACT

In an embodiment, a radio communication device may be provided. The radio communication device may include a first receiver configured to receive from a first cell first data representing a content encoded using a first codec; a second receiver configured to receive from a second cell second data representing the content encoded using a second codec; and a combiner configured to combine the first data and the second data.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.13/966,362 filed on Aug. 14, 2013, which is a continuation of U.S.patent application Ser. No. 12/845,800 filed on Jul. 29, 2010, now U.S.Pat. No. 8,521,109 issued Aug. 27, 2013, the content and disclosure ofwhich are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.

TECHNICAL FIELD

Embodiments relate generally to radio communication devices, informationproviders, methods for controlling a radio communication device, andmethods for controlling an information provider.

BACKGROUND

In various environments, mobile radio communication devices maysimultaneously have access to a plurality of cells. For example in thecase when the mobile radio communication devices are moving, the numberand kind of cells that are available may change. For example, the radiocommunication device may move out of the range of a cell, or the radiocommunication device may enter the range of a cell.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

In the drawings, like reference characters generally refer to the sameparts throughout the different views. The drawings are not necessarilyto scale, emphasis instead generally being placed upon illustrating theprinciples of the invention. In the following description, variousembodiments of the invention are described with reference to thefollowing drawings, in which:

FIG. 1 shows an area, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice in accordance with an embodiment is provided;

FIG. 2 shows a radio communication device in accordance with anembodiment;

FIG. 3 shows a radio communication device in accordance with anembodiment;

FIG. 4 shows an information provider in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 5 shows an information provider in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 6 shows a flow diagram illustrating a method for controlling aradio communication device in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 7 shows a flow diagram illustrating a method for controlling aninformation provider in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 8 shows an information provider in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 9 shows an area, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice in accordance with an embodiment is provided;

FIG. 10 shows an area, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice in accordance with an embodiment is provided;

FIG. 11 shows a diagram illustrating a plurality of data streams inaccordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 12 shows a flow diagram illustrating basic network tasks forprovision of heterogeneous broadcast/multicast services in accordancewith an embodiment;

FIG. 13 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 14 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 15 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 16 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 17 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;

FIG. 18 shows a network architecture in accordance with an embodiment;and

FIG. 19 shows a control-plane protocol stack in accordance with anembodiment.

DESCRIPTION

According to various embodiments, a radio communication device mayreceive a plurality of data streams using a plurality of radio accesstechnologies (RATs). The radio communication device may be able todecode each of the plurality of data streams on its own, for example toobtain video data included in the encoded data. In case the radiocommunication device is able to receive more than one data stream, itmay combine the data streams, and may decode the combined data stream,and thereby may increase the quality of the decoded data, for examplethe quality of the decoded video.

The following detailed description refers to the accompanying drawingsthat show, by way of illustration, specific details and embodiments inwhich the invention may be practiced. Other embodiments may be utilizedand structural, logical, and electrical changes may be made withoutdeparting from the scope of the invention. The various embodiments arenot necessarily mutually exclusive, as some embodiments can be combinedwith one or more other embodiments to form new embodiments. Thefollowing detailed description therefore, is not to be taken in alimiting sense, and the scope of the present invention is defined by theappended claims.

The word “exemplary” is used herein to mean “serving as an example,instance, or illustration”. Any embodiment or design described herein as“exemplary” is not necessarily to be construed as preferred oradvantageous over other embodiments or designs.

A radio communication device according to various embodiments may be adevice configured for wireless communication. In various embodiments, aradio communication device may be an end-user mobile device (MD). Invarious embodiments, a radio communication device may be any kind ofmobile radio communication device, mobile telephone, personal digitalassistant, mobile computer, or any other mobile device configured forcommunication with a mobile communication base station (BS) or an accesspoint (AP) and may be also referred to as a User Equipment (UE), amobile station (MS) or an advanced mobile station (advanced MS, AMS),for example in accordance with IEEE 802.16m.

A radio communication device according to various embodiments mayinclude a memory which is for example used in the processing carried outby the end-user mobile devices. A memory used in the embodiments may bea volatile memory, for example a DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) ora non-volatile memory, for example a PROM (Programmable Read OnlyMemory), an EPROM (Erasable PROM), EEPROM (Electrically Erasable PROM),or a flash memory, e.g., a floating gate memory, a charge trappingmemory, an MRAM (Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory) or a PCRAM(Phase Change Random Access Memory).

An information provider according to various embodiments may include amemory which is for example used in the processing carried out by theradio base station. A memory used in the embodiments may be a volatilememory, for example a DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memory) or anon-volatile memory, for example a PROM (Programmable Read Only Memory),an EPROM (Erasable PROM), EEPROM (Electrically Erasable PROM), or aflash memory, e.g., a floating gate memory, a charge trapping memory, anMRAM (Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory) or a PCRAM (Phase ChangeRandom Access Memory).

In an embodiment, a “circuit” may be understood as any kind of a logicimplementing entity, which may be special purpose circuitry or aprocessor executing software stored in a memory, firmware, or anycombination thereof. Thus, in an embodiment, a “circuit” may be ahard-wired logic circuit or a programmable logic circuit such as aprogrammable processor, e.g. a microprocessor (e.g. a ComplexInstruction Set Computer (CISC) processor or a Reduced Instruction SetComputer (RISC) processor). A “circuit” may also be a processorexecuting software, e.g. any kind of computer program, e.g. a computerprogram using a virtual machine code such as e.g. Java. Any other kindof implementation of the respective functions which will be described inmore detail below may also be understood as a “circuit” in accordancewith an alternative embodiment.

The terms “coupling” or “connection” are intended to include a direct“coupling” or direct “connection” as well as an indirect “coupling” orindirect “connection”, respectively.

The term “protocol” is intended to include any piece of software that isprovided to implement part of any layer of the communication definition.“Protocol” may include the functionality of one or more of the followinglayers: physical layer (layer 1), data link layer (layer 2), networklayer (layer 3), or any other sub-layer of the mentioned layers or anyupper layer.

The term “cell” is intended to include any kind of cell, for example acell provided by a base station according to any of the radio accesstechnologies mentioned below, for example a 3GPP (Third GenerationPartnership Project) base station, a WiMax base station, or a WLAN(Wireless Local Area network) access point, as will be explained in moredetail below. Furthermore, a cell may be a macro cell, a micro cell, apico cell or a femto-cell, as will be explained in more detail below.Information received from a cell is intended to include informationreceived of the respective base station or access point of that cell.Cells may overlap geographically, for example, more than one cell may beable to send info illation to a mobile radio terminal at apre-determined geographical location.

According to various embodiments, “decoding” of data may be understoodas processing the data to obtain “useful” information, for exampleprocessing data to obtain a series of images (for example a video) or aseries of audio signals.

Various embodiments are provided for devices, and various embodimentsare provided for methods. It will be understood that basic properties ofthe devices also hold for the methods and vice versa. Therefore, forsake of brevity, duplicate description of such properties may beomitted.

FIG. 1 shows an area 100, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice in accordance with an embodiment may be provided.

In the area 100, there may be provided a plurality of macrocells, forexample one or a plurality of 3GPP (Third Generation PartnershipProject) LTE (Long Term Evolution) macro cells, each served by (in otherwords: provided by) a standard eNodeB (eNB). For example, a first 3GPPLTE macro-cell 102 may be served by a first standard eNB 104. Forexample, a second 3GPP LTE macro-cell 106 may be served by a secondstandard eNB 108. For example, a third 3GPP LTE macro-cell 110 may beserved by a third standard eNB 112. For example, a fourth 3GPP LTEmacro-cell 114 may be served by a fourth standard eNB 116. For example,a fifth 3GPP LTE macro-cell 118 may be served by a fifth standard eNB120. For example, a sixth 3GPP LTE macro-cell 122 may be served by asixth standard eNB 124. For example, a seventh 3GPP LTE macro-cell 126may be served by a seventh standard eNB 128. For example, an eighth 3GPPLTE macro-cell 130 may be served by an eighth standard eNB 132.

Furthermore, in the area 100, there may be one or a plurality ofFemto-Cells served by 3GPP LTE HeNBs (Home eNB). According to variousembodiments, a Femto-Cell may overlap with one or multiple standardeNBs. For example, a femto-cell 134 served by a HeNB 136 may beprovided. The femto-cell 134 may overlap with the first macro-cell 102,with the third macro-cell 110, and the fourth macro-cell 114.

Furthermore, in the area 100, one or a plurality of WiFi Cells may beprovided. WiFi cell may be under control by an entity different from thecellular network operator. For example, a WiFi cell 138 may be providedby WiFi base station 140.

In the area 100, a UE 142 may be considered, and the UE 142 may bemoving through various cell coverage areas, as will be explained in moredetail below, and as indicated by arrow 144 and road 146.

FIG. 2 shows a radio communication device 200 in accordance with anembodiment. The radio communication device 200 may include a firstreceiver 202 configured to receive from a first cell first datarepresenting a content encoded using a first codec; a second receiver204 configured to receive from a second cell second data representingthe content encoded using a second codec; and a combiner 206 configuredto combine the first data and the second data. The first receiver 202,the second receiver 204 and the combiner 206 may be coupled with eachother, e.g. via an electrical connection 208 such as e.g. a cable or acomputer bus or via any other suitable electrical connection to exchangeelectrical signals.

The first cell and the second cell may be different. The first cell maybe configured according to a first radio access technology. The secondcell may be configured according to a second radio access technology.

According to various embodiments, the radio communication device mayfurther include a decoder (not shown), configured to decode the combineddata and a reception discontinuation determiner (not shown) configuredto determine whether the first receiver stops receiving the first dataand to determine whether the second receiver stops receiving the seconddata. The decoder may be further configured to decode the first datawhen the reception discontinuation determiner determines that the secondreceiver stops receiving the second data. The decoder may be furtherconfigured to decode the second data when the reception discontinuationdeterminer determines that the first receiver stops receiving the firstdata.

According to various embodiments, the decoder may be configured todecode the first data when the reception discontinuation determinerdetermines that the second receiver stops receiving the second data andthat the first receiver does not stop receiving the first data. Thedecoder may be further configured to decode the second data when thereception discontinuation determiner determines that the first receiverstops receiving the first data and that the second receiver does notstop receiving the second data.

According to various embodiments, the first codec and the second codecmay be parts of an overall codec. For example, the first codec and thesecond codec may not operate independent from each other, but mayoperate in co-operation. According to various embodiments, the codecsmay apply a “Multiple Description Coding (MDC)” approach, in otherwords, the first codec and the second codec may be configured accordingto a “Multiple Description Coding (MDC)” approach.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude at least one further receiver (not shown) configured to receivefrom a further cell further data representing the content encoded usinga further codec. The further cell may be configured according to afurther radio access technology. According to various embodiments, anynumber of receivers may receive any number of data (for example anynumber of data flows) representing the content encoded using variouscodecs, and any data alone or any combinations of the data may be usedto decode the content. The number of receivers may not have to beidentical to the number of data, for example, the number of data may behigher than the number of receivers, so that at least one receiverreceives more than one data.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be a radio accesstechnology of one of the following radio access technology families:

-   -   a Short Range radio access technology family;    -   a Metropolitan Area System radio access technology family;    -   a Cellular Wide Area radio access technology family;    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a random manner; and    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a centrally controlled manner.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be one of thefollowing radio access technologies: a Bluetooth radio accesstechnology, an Ultra Wide Band (UWB) radio access technology, a WirelessLocal Area Network radio access technology (e.g. according to an IEEE802.11 (e.g. IEEE 802.11n) radio communication standard)), IrDA(Infrared Data Association), Z-Wave and ZigBee, HiperLAN/2 ((HighPErformance Radio LAN; an alternative ATM-like 5 GHz standardizedtechnology), IEEE 802.11a (5 GHz), IEEE 802.11g (2.4 GHz), IEEE 802.11n,IEEE 802.11VHT (VHT=Very High Throughput), e.g. IEEE 802.11ac for VHTbelow 6 GHz and IEEE 802.11ad for VHT at 60 GHz, a WorldwideInteroperability for Microwave Access (WiMax) (e.g. according to an IEEE802.16 radio communication standard, e.g. WiMax fixed or WiMax mobile),WiPro, HiperMAN (High Performance Radio Metropolitan Area Network), IEEE802.16m Advanced Air Interface, a Global System for MobileCommunications (GSM) radio access technology, a General Packet RadioService (GPRS) radio access technology, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSMEvolution (EDGE) radio access technology, and/or a Third GenerationPartnership Project (3GPP) radio access technology (e.g. UMTS (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System), FOMA (Freedom of Multimedia Access),3GPP LTE (long term Evolution), 3GPP LTE Advanced (long term EvolutionAdvanced)), CDMA2000 (Code division multiple access 2000), CDPD(Cellular Digital Packet Data), Mobitex, 3G (Third Generation), CSD(Circuit Switched Data), HSCSD (High-Speed Circuit-Switched Data), UMTS(3G) (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (Third Generation)),W-CDMA (UMTS) (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (Universal MobileTelecommunications System)), HSPA (High Speed Packet Access), HSDPA(High-Speed Downlink Packet Access), HSUPA (High-Speed Uplink PacketAccess), HSPA+ (High Speed Packet Access Plus), UMTS-TDD (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System-Time-Division Duplex), TD-CDMA (TimeDivision-Code Division Multiple Access), TD-SCDMA (TimeDivision-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access), 3GPP Rel. 8(Pre-4G) (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 8 (Pre-4thGeneration)), UTRA (UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access), E-UTRA (Evolved UMTSTerrestrial Radio Access), LTE Advanced (4G) (long term EvolutionAdvanced (4th Generation)), cdmaOne (2G), CDMA2000 (3G) (Code divisionmultiple access 2000 (Third generation)), EV-DO (Evolution-DataOptimized or Evolution-Data Only), AMPS (1G) (Advanced Mobile PhoneSystem (1st Generation)), TACS/ETACS (Total Access CommunicationSystem/Extended Total Access Communication System), D-AMPS (2G) (DigitalAMPS (2nd Generation)), PTT (Push-to-talk), MTS (Mobile TelephoneSystem), IMTS (Improved Mobile Telephone System), AMTS (Advanced MobileTelephone System), OLT (Norwegian for Offentlig Landmobil Telefoni,Public Land Mobile Telephony), MTD (Swedish abbreviation forMobiltelefonisystem D, or Mobile telephony system D), Autotel/PALM(Public Automated Land Mobile), ARP (Finnish for Autoradiopuhelin, “carradio phone”), NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), Hicap (High capacityversion of NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone)), CDPD (Cellular DigitalPacket Data), Mobitex, DataTAC, iDEN (Integrated Digital EnhancedNetwork), PDC (Personal Digital Cellular), PHS (Personal Handy-phoneSystem), WiDEN (Wideband Integrated Digital Enhanced Network), iBurst,and Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA, also referred to as 3GPP GenericAccess Network, or GAN standard)).

In various embodiments, at least one of the first receiver 202 and thesecond receiver 204 may be configured to receive the data using at leastone of unicast, multicast and broadcast.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be different.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be identical.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bemultiple description codecs, as will be explained in more detail below.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bevideo codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beaudio codecs.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude a first decoder (not shown) configured to decode the first datato obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude a second decoder (not shown) configured to decode the seconddata to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude a combined decoder (not shown) configured to decode the combinedfirst data and second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude a decoder (not shown), wherein the decoder may be configured todecode the first data to obtain the content; wherein the decoder may befurther configured to decode the second data to obtain the content; andwherein the decoder may be further configured to decode the combinedfirst data and second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the quality of the decoded content may be higherwhen it is decoded from the combined first data and second data comparedto when it is decoded from the first data alone or when it is decodedfrom the second data alone.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 200 may furtherinclude an output circuit (not shown) configured to output the decodedcontent.

In various embodiments, the output circuit may include at least one of adisplay and a loudspeaker.

FIG. 3 shows a radio communication device 300 in accordance with anembodiment. The radio communication device 300 may include, similar tothe radio communication device 200 of FIG. 2, a first receiver 202, asecond receiver 204, and a combiner 206. The radio communication device300 may further include a locator 302, as will be explained in moredetail below. The radio communication device 300 may further include anavailable cell determiner 304, as will be explained in more detailbelow. The radio communication device 300 may further include a datarequester 306, as will be explained in more detail below. The radiocommunication device 300 may further include a quality of servicedeterminer 308, as will be explained in more detail below. The firstreceiver 202, the second receiver 204, the combiner 206, the locator302, the available cell determiner 304, the data requester 306, and thequality of service determiner 308 may be coupled with each other, e.g.via an electrical connection 310 such as e.g. a cable or a computer busor via any other suitable electrical connection to exchange electricalsignals.

In various embodiments, the locator 302 may be configured to determinethe position of the radio communication device 300.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 300 may furtherinclude a position information transmitter (not shown) configured totransmit information representing the position determined by the locator302 to an information provider (not shown).

In various embodiments, the available cell determiner 304 may beconfigured to determine, whether a predetermined cell is available forthe radio communication device 300. According to various embodiments,the available cell determiner 304 may further be configured to determinethe most suitable combination of Radio Access technologies, for examplesuch that the overall power consumption is minimized in the UE, or thatthe subscription cost for the user is minimized.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 300 may furtherinclude an available cell information transmitter (not shown) configuredto transmit information indicating whether the pre-determined cell isavailable for the radio communication device 300 to an informationprovider.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 300 may furtherinclude a data reception deter liner (not shown) configured to determinewhether data representing the content is received using a pre-determinedcell.

In various embodiments, the data requester 306 may be configured torequest transmission of further data representing the content encodedusing a further codec from a further cell from an information provider.

In various embodiments, the quality of service determiner 308 may beconfigured to determine a required quality of service of the content forthe radio communication device 300.

In various embodiments, the radio communication device 300 may furtherinclude a quality of service information transmitter (not shown)configured to transmit information representing the quality of servicedetermined by the quality of service determiner 308 to an informationprovider.

FIG. 4 shows an information provider 400 in accordance with anembodiment. The information provider 400 may include a first datagenerator 402 configured to generate first data from a content using afirst codec; a second data generator 404 configured to generate seconddata from the content using a second codec; a first transmitter 406configured to transmit using a first cell the first data; and a secondtransmitter 408 configured to transmit using a second cell the seconddata. The first data generator 402, the second data generator 404, thefirst transmitter 406, and the second transmitter 408 may be coupledwith each other, e.g. via an electrical connection 410 such as e.g. acable or a computer bus or via any other suitable electrical connectionto exchange electrical signals.

The first cell and the second cell may be different. The first cell maybe configured according to a first radio access technology. The secondcell may be configured according to a second radio access technology.

According to various embodiments, the information provider may furtherinclude an available cell determiner (not shown) configured to determinea plurality of cells that is available for transmitting the first dataand the second data to a radio communication device; and a cell selector(not shown) configured to select the first cell and the second cell fromthe plurality of cells based on a pre-determined criterion. For example,the available cell deter miner may be configured to determine, for apre-determined radio communication device, which cells may provide radioservices to the radio communication device, and may select one of thesecells as the first cell and another one of these cells as the secondcell.

According to various embodiments, the pre-determined criterion mayinclude a criterion based on a coverage area of the first cell and ofthe second cell. For example, at least one of the first cell and thesecond cell may be chosen so as to cover an area with at least apre-determined size. For example, this may ensure that even if the radiocommunication device moves over large distances, at least one data flowis constantly received.

According to various embodiments, the pre-determined criterion mayinclude a criterion based on a transmission bandwidth of the first celland of the second cell. For example, at least one of the first cell andthe second cell may be chosen so as to be a cell that may provide atransmission bandwidth (in other words: a transmission speed) of atleast a pre-determined amount. For example, this may ensure that apre-determined amount of data arrives in every time interval at theradio communication device.

According to various embodiments, both a cell with at least apre-determined coverage area (for example as the first cell) and a cellwith at least a pre-determined transmission bandwidth (for example asthe second cell) may be chosen. This may ensure both that even if theradio communication device moves over large distances, at least one dataflow is constantly received, and that a pre-determined amount of dataarrives in every time interval at the radio communication device.

In various embodiments, the information provider 400 may further includeat least one further data generator (not shown) configured to generatefurther data from the content encoded using a further codec; and atleast one further transmitter (not shown) configured to transmit using afurther cell the further data. The further cell may be configuredaccording to a further radio access technology.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be a radio accesstechnology of one of the following radio access technology families:

-   -   a Short Range radio access technology family;    -   a Metropolitan Area System radio access technology family;    -   a Cellular Wide Area radio access technology family;    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a random manner; and    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a centrally controlled manner.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be one of thefollowing radio access technologies: a Bluetooth radio accesstechnology, an Ultra Wide Band (UWB) radio access technology, a WirelessLocal Area Network radio access technology (e.g. according to an IEEE802.11 (e.g. IEEE 802.11n) radio communication standard)), IrDA(Infrared Data Association), Z-Wave and ZigBee, HiperLAN/2 ((HighPErformance Radio LAN; an alternative ATM-like 5 GHz standardizedtechnology), IEEE 802.11a (5 GHz), IEEE 802.11g (2.4 GHz), IEEE 802.11n,IEEE 802.11VHT (VHT=Very High Throughput), e.g. IEEE 802.11ac for VHTbelow 6 GHz and IEEE 802.11ad for VHT at 60 GHz, a WorldwideInteroperability for Microwave Access (WiMax) (e.g. according to an IEEE802.16 radio communication standard, e.g. WiMax fixed or WiMax mobile),WiPro, HiperMAN (High Performance Radio Metropolitan Area Network), IEEE802.16m Advanced Air Interface, a Global System for MobileCommunications (GSM) radio access technology, a General Packet RadioService (GPRS) radio access technology, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSMEvolution (EDGE) radio access technology, and/or a Third GenerationPartnership Project (3GPP) radio access technology (e.g. UMTS (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System), FOMA (Freedom of Multimedia Access),3GPP LTE (long term Evolution), 3GPP LTE Advanced (long term EvolutionAdvanced)), CDMA2000 (Code division multiple access 2000), CDPD(Cellular Digital Packet Data), Mobitex, 3G (Third Generation), CSD(Circuit Switched Data), HSCSD (High-Speed Circuit-Switched Data); UMTS(3G) (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (Third Generation)),W-CDMA (UMTS) (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (Universal MobileTelecommunications System)), HSPA (High Speed Packet Access), HSDPA(High-Speed Downlink Packet Access), HSUPA (High-Speed Uplink PacketAccess), HSPA+ (High Speed Packet Access Plus), UMTS-TDD (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System-Time-Division Duplex), TD-CDMA (TimeDivision-Code Division Multiple Access), TD-SCDMA (TimeDivision-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access), 3GPP Rel. 8(Pre-4G) (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 8 (Pre-4thGeneration)), UTRA (UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access), E-UTRA (Evolved UMTSTerrestrial Radio Access), LTE Advanced (4G) (long term EvolutionAdvanced (4th. Generation)), cdmaOne (2G), CDMA2000 (3G) (Code divisionmultiple access 2000 (Third generation)), EV-DO (Evolution-DataOptimized or Evolution-Data Only), AMPS (1G) (Advanced Mobile PhoneSystem (1st Generation)), TACS/ETACS (Total Access CommunicationSystem/Extended Total Access Communication System), D-AMPS (2G) (DigitalAMPS (2nd Generation)), PTT (Push-to-talk), MTS (Mobile TelephoneSystem), IMTS (Improved Mobile Telephone System), AMTS (Advanced MobileTelephone System), OLT (Norwegian for Offentlig Landmobil Telefoni,Public Land Mobile Telephony), MTD (Swedish abbreviation forMobiltelefonisystem D, or Mobile telephony system D), Autotel/PALM(Public Automated Land Mobile), ARP (Finnish for Autoradiopuhelin, “carradio phone”), NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), Hicap (High capacityversion of NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone)), CDPD (Cellular DigitalPacket Data), Mobitex, DataTAC, iDEN (Integrated Digital EnhancedNetwork), PDC (Personal Digital Cellular), PHS (Personal Handy-phoneSystem), WiDEN (Wideband Integrated Digital Enhanced Network), iBurst,and Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA, also referred to as 3GPP GenericAccess Network, or GAN standard)).

In various embodiments, at least one of the first transmitter 406 andthe second transmitter 408 may be configured to transmit the data usingat least one of unicast, multicast and broadcast.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be different.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be identical.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bemultiple description codecs, as will be explained in more detail below.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bevideo codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beaudio codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the first data to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the second data to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode a combination of the first dataand second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the first data to obtain thecontent; where the first codec and the second codec may be furtherconfigured so that the same decoder can decode the second data to obtainthe content; and wherein the first codec and the second codec may befurther configured so that the same decoder can decode a combination ofthe first data and second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the quality of the decoded content may be higherwhen it is decoded from the combined first data and second data comparedto when it is decoded from the first data alone or when it is decodedfrom the second data alone.

FIG. 5 shows an information provider 500 in accordance with anembodiment. The information provider 500 may include, similar to theinformation provider 400 of FIG. 4, a first data generator 402, a seconddata generator 404, a first transmitter 406, and a second transmitter408. The information provider 500 may further include a positioninformation receiver 502, as will be explained in more detail below. Theinformation provider 500 may further include an available cellinformation determiner 504, as will be explained in more detail below.The information provider 500 may further include an available cellinformation receiver 506, as will be explained in more detail below. Theinformation provider 500 may further include a data request receiver508, as will be explained in more detail below. The information provider500 may further include a quality of service information receiver 510,as will be explained in more detail below. The information provider 500may further include a bearer availability determiner 512, as will beexplained in more detail below. The first data generator 402, the seconddata generator 404, the first transmitter 406, the second transmitter408, the position information receiver 502, the available cellinformation determiner 504, the available cell information receiver 506,the data request receiver 508, the quality of service informationreceiver 510, and the bearer availability determiner 512 may be coupledwith each other, e.g. via an electrical connection 514 such as e.g. acable or a computer bus or via any other suitable electrical connectionto exchange electrical signals.

In various embodiments, the position information receiver 502 may beconfigured to receive information representing a position of a radiocommunication device.

In various embodiments, the available cell information determiner 504may be configured to determine whether a pre-determined cell isavailable for the radio communication device based on the positioninformation received by the position information receiver 502. Accordingto various embodiments, the available cell information determiner 504may further be configured to determine the most suitable combination ofRadio Access technologies, for example such that the overall powerconsumption is minimized in the UE, or that the subscription cost forthe user is minimized.

According to various embodiments, a device of the network (for examplethe information provider) may analyze the most used Radio AccessTechnologies (RAT) in a given area, may create a number of redundantflows (for example a number of redundant data) and may broadcast themfollowing the level of RAT acceptance by the users in a given area.

In various embodiments, the information provider 500 may further includean encoding parameter determiner (not shown) configured to determinecoding parameters for at least one of the first codec and the secondcodec, based on the determination whether a pre-determined cell isavailable for the radio communication device.

In various embodiments, the available cell information receiver 506 maybe configured to receive information indicating whether a pre-determinedcell is available for a radio communication device.

In various embodiments, the information provider 500 may further includean encoding parameter determiner (not shown) configured to determinecoding parameters for at least one of the first codec and the secondcodec, based on the received information indicating whether apre-determined cell is available for the radio communication device.

In various embodiments, the data request receiver 508 may be configuredto receive from a radio communication device (not shown) a request fortransmission of further data representing the content encoded using afurther codec using a further cell.

In various embodiments, the quality of service information receiver 510may be configured to receive information representing the requiredquality of service of the content for a radio communication device.

In various embodiments, the information provider 500 may further includean encoding parameter determiner (not shown) configured to determinecoding parameters for at least one of the first codec and the secondcodec, based on the received information representing the requiredquality of service.

In various embodiments, the bearer availability determiner 512 may beconfigured to determine whether a bearer for a pre-determined cell isavailable.

In various embodiments, the information provider 500 may further includean encoding parameter determiner (not shown) configured to determinecoding parameters for at least one of the first codec and the secondcodec, based on the determination whether a bearer for a pre-determinedcell is available.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first data generator 402 andthe second data generator 404 may generate the data by encoding thecontent.

In various embodiments, the information provider may further include astorage (not shown), configured to store data representing the contentencoded using a codec; wherein at least one of the first data generatoror the second data generator generates the data by retrieving data fromthe storage.

FIG. 6 shows a flow diagram 600 illustrating a method for controlling aradio communication device in accordance with an embodiment. In 602,first data representing a content encoded using a first codec may bereceived from a first cell. In 604, second data representing the contentencoded using a second codec may be received from a second cell. In 606,the first data and the second data may be combined.

The first cell and the second cell may be different. The first cell maybe configured according to a first radio access technology. The secondcell may be configured according to a second radio access technology.

According to various embodiments, the method may further includedecoding the combined data, determining whether receiving the first datais stopped, determining whether receiving the second data is stopped,decoding the first data when it is determined that receiving the seconddata is stopped, and decoding the second data when it is determined thatreceiving the first data is stopped.

According to various embodiments, the first data may be decoded when itis determined that receiving the second data is stopped and thatreceiving the first data is not stopped. According to variousembodiments, the second data may be decoded when it is determined thatreceiving the first data is stopped and that receiving the second datais not stopped.

According to various embodiments, the first codec and the second codecmay be parts of an overall codec. For example, the first codec and thesecond codec may not operate independent from each other, but mayoperate in co-operation. According to various embodiments, the codecsmay apply a “Multiple Description Coding (MDC)”, in other words, thefirst codec and the second codec may be configured according to a“Multiple Description Coding (MDC)” approach.

In various embodiments, further data representing the content encodedusing a further codec may be received from a further cell. The furthercell may be configured according to a further radio access technology.According to various embodiments, any number of receivers may receiveany number of data (for example any number of data flows) representingthe content encoded using various codecs, and any data alone or anycombinations of the data may be used to decode the content. The numberof receivers may not have to be identical to the number of data, forexample, the number of data may be higher than the number of receivers,so that at least one receiver receives more than one data.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be a radio accesstechnology of one of the following radio access technology families:

-   -   a Short Range radio access technology family;    -   a Metropolitan Area System radio access technology family;    -   a Cellular Wide Area radio access technology family;    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a random manner; and    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a centrally controlled manner.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be one of thefollowing radio access technologies: a Bluetooth radio accesstechnology, an Ultra Wide Band (UWB) radio access technology, a WirelessLocal Area Network radio access technology (e.g. according to an IEEE802.11 (e.g. IEEE 802.11n) radio communication standard)), IrDA(Infrared Data Association), Z-Wave and ZigBee, HiperLAN/2 ((HighPErformance Radio LAN; an alternative ATM-like 5 GHz standardizedtechnology), IEEE 802.11a (5 GHz), IEEE 802.11g (2.4 GHz), IEEE 802.11n,IEEE 802.11VHT (VHT=Very High Throughput), e.g. IEEE 802.11ac for VHTbelow 6 GHz and IEEE 802.11ad for VHT at 60 GHz, a WorldwideInteroperability for Microwave Access (WiMax) (e.g. according to an IEEE802.16 radio communication standard, e.g. WiMax fixed or WiMax mobile),WiPro, HiperMAN (High Performance Radio Metropolitan Area Network), IEEE802.16m Advanced Air Interface, a Global System for MobileCommunications (GSM) radio access technology, a General Packet RadioService (GPRS) radio access technology, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSMEvolution (EDGE) radio access technology, and/or a Third GenerationPartnership Project (3GPP) radio access technology (e.g. UMTS (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System), FOMA (Freedom of Multimedia Access),3GPP LTE (long term Evolution), 3GPP LTE Advanced (long term EvolutionAdvanced)), CDMA2000 (Code division multiple access 2000), CDPD(Cellular Digital Packet Data), Mobitex, 3G (Third Generation), CSD(Circuit Switched Data), HSCSD (High-Speed Circuit-Switched Data), UMTS(3G) (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (Third Generation)),W-CDMA (UMTS) (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (Universal MobileTelecommunications System)), HSPA (High Speed Packet Access), HSDPA(High-Speed Downlink Packet Access), HSUPA (High-Speed Uplink PacketAccess), HSPA+ (High Speed Packet Access Plus), UMTS-TDD (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System-Time-Division Duplex), TD-CDMA (TimeDivision-Code Division Multiple Access), TD-SCDMA (TimeDivision-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access), 3GPP Rel. 8(Pre-4G) (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 8 (Pre-4thGeneration)), UTRA (UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access), E-UTRA (Evolved UMTSTerrestrial Radio Access), LTE Advanced (4G) (long term EvolutionAdvanced (4th Generation)), cdmaOne (2G), CDMA2000 (3G) (Code divisionmultiple access 2000 (Third generation)), EV-DO (Evolution-DataOptimized or Evolution-Data Only), AMPS (1G) (Advanced Mobile PhoneSystem (1st Generation)), TACS/ETACS (Total Access CommunicationSystem/Extended Total Access Communication System), D-AMPS (2G) (DigitalAMPS (2nd Generation)), PTT (Push-to-talk), MTS (Mobile TelephoneSystem), IMTS (Improved Mobile Telephone System), AMTS (Advanced MobileTelephone System), OLT (Norwegian for Offentlig Landmobil Telefoni,Public Land Mobile Telephony), MTD (Swedish abbreviation forMobiltelefonisystem D, or Mobile telephony system D), Autotel/PALM(Public Automated Land Mobile), ARP (Finnish for Autoradiopuhelin, “carradio phone”), NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), Hicap (High capacityversion of NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone)), CDPD (Cellular DigitalPacket Data), Mobitex, DataTAC, iDEN (Integrated Digital EnhancedNetwork), PDC (Personal Digital Cellular), PHS (Personal Handy-phoneSystem), WIDEN (Wideband Integrated Digital Enhanced Network), iBurst,and Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA, also referred to as 3GPP GenericAccess Network, or GAN standard)).

In various embodiments, the data may be received using at least one ofunicast, multicast and broadcast.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be different.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be identical.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bemultiple description codecs, as will be explained in more detail below.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bevideo codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beaudio codecs.

In various embodiments, the first data may be decoded to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the second data may be decoded to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the combined first data and second data may bedecoded to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the quality of the decoded content may be higherwhen it is decoded from the combined first data and second data comparedto when it is decoded from the first data alone or when it is decodedfrom the second data alone.

In various embodiments, the decoded content may be outputted.

In various embodiments, the decoded content may be outputted by at leastone of a display and a loudspeaker.

In various embodiments, the position of the radio communication devicemay be determined.

In various embodiments, information representing the determined positionmay be transmitted to an information provider.

In various embodiments, it may be determined, whether a predeterminedcell is available for the radio communication device. According tovarious embodiments, the most suitable combination of Radio Accesstechnologies may be determined, for example such that the overall powerconsumption is minimized in the UE, or that the subscription cost forthe user is minimized.

In various embodiments, info′ illation indicating whether thepre-determined cell is available for the radio communication device maybe transmitted to an information provider.

In various embodiments, it may be determined whether data representingthe content is received from a pre-determined cell.

In various embodiments, transmission of further data representing thecontent encoded using a further codec from a further cell may berequested from an information provider.

In various embodiments, a required quality of service of the content forthe radio communication device may be determined.

In various embodiments, information representing the determined qualityof service may be transmitted to an information provider.

FIG. 7 shows a flow diagram 700 illustrating a method for controlling aninformation provider in accordance with an embodiment. In 702, firstdata may be generated from a content using a first codec. In 704, seconddata may be generated from the content using a second codec. In 706, thefirst data may be transmitted using a first cell. In 708, the seconddata may be transmitted using a second cell.

The first cell and the second cell may be different. The first cell maybe configured according to a first radio access technology. The secondcell may be configured according to a second radio access technology.

According to various embodiments, a plurality of cells that is availablefor transmitting the first data and the second data to a radiocommunication device may be determined; and the first cell and thesecond cell may be selected from the plurality of cells based on apre-determined criterion. For example, it may be determined, for apre-determined radio communication device, which cells may provide radioservices to the radio communication device, and one of these cells maybe selected as the first cell and another one of these cells may beselected as the second cell.

According to various embodiments, the pre-determined criterion mayinclude a criterion based on a coverage area of the first cell and ofthe second cell. For example, at least one of the first cell and thesecond cell may be chosen so as to cover an area with at least apre-determined size. For example, this may ensure that even if the radiocommunication device moves over large distances, at least one data flowis constantly received.

According to various embodiments, the pre-determined criterion mayinclude a criterion based on a transmission bandwidth of the first celland of the second cell. For example, at least one of the first cell andthe second cell may be chosen so as to be a cell that may provide atransmission bandwidth (in other words: a transmission speed) of atleast a pre-determined amount. For example, this may ensure that apre-determined amount of data arrives in every time interval at theradio communication device.

According to various embodiments, both a cell with at least apre-determined coverage area (for example as the first cell) and a cellwith at least a pre-determined transmission bandwidth (for example asthe second cell) may be chosen. This may ensure both that even if theradio communication device moves over large distances, at least one dataflow is constantly received, and that a pre-determined amount of dataarrives in every time interval at the radio communication device.

In various embodiments, further data may be generated from the contentencoded using a further codec, and the further data may be transmittedusing a further cell. The further cell may be configured according to afurther radio access technology.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be a radio accesstechnology of one of the following radio access technology families:

-   -   a Short Range radio access technology family;    -   a Metropolitan Area System radio access technology family;    -   a Cellular Wide Area radio access technology family;    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a random manner; and    -   a radio access technology family which includes a radio access        technology in which the access to radio resources is provided in        a centrally controlled manner.

In various embodiments, at least one of the first radio accesstechnology and the second radio access technology may be one of thefollowing radio access technologies: a Bluetooth radio accesstechnology, an Ultra Wide Band (UWB) radio access technology, a WirelessLocal Area Network radio access technology (e.g. according to an IEEE802.11 (e.g. IEEE 802.11n) radio communication standard)), IrDA(Infrared Data Association), Z-Wave and ZigBee, HiperLAN/2 ((HighPErformance Radio LAN; an alternative ATM-like 5 GHz standardizedtechnology), IEEE 802.11a (5 GHz), IEEE 802.11g (2.4 GHz), IEEE 802.11n,IEEE 802.11VHT (VHT=Very High Throughput), e.g. IEEE 802.11ac for VHTbelow 6 GHz and IEEE 802.11ad for VHT at 60 GHz, a WorldwideInteroperability for Microwave Access (WiMax) (e.g. according to an IEEE802.16 radio communication standard, e.g. WiMax fixed or WiMax mobile),WiPro, HiperMAN (High Performance Radio Metropolitan Area Network), IEEE802.16m Advanced Air Interface, a Global System for MobileCommunications (GSM) radio access technology, a General Packet RadioService (GPRS) radio access technology, an Enhanced Data Rates for GSMEvolution (EDGE) radio access technology, and/or a Third GenerationPartnership Project (3GPP) radio access technology (e.g. UMTS (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System), FOMA (Freedom of Multimedia Access),3GPP LTE (long term Evolution), 3GPP LTE Advanced (long term EvolutionAdvanced)), CDMA2000 (Code division multiple access 2000), CDPD(Cellular Digital Packet Data), Mobitex, 3G (Third Generation), CSD(Circuit Switched Data), HSCSD (High-Speed Circuit-Switched Data), UMTS(3G) (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (Third Generation)),W-CDMA (UMTS) (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (Universal MobileTelecommunications System)), HSPA (High Speed Packet Access), HSDPA(High-Speed Downlink Packet Access), HSDPA (High-Speed Uplink PacketAccess), HSPA+(High Speed Packet Access Plus), UMTS-TDD (UniversalMobile Telecommunications System-Time-Division Duplex), TD-CDMA (TimeDivision-Code Division Multiple Access), TD-SCDMA (TimeDivision-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access), 3GPP Rel. 8(Pre-4G) (3rd Generation Partnership Project Release 8 (Pre-4thGeneration)), UTRA (UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access), E-UTRA (Evolved UMTSTerrestrial Radio Access), LTE Advanced (4G) (long term EvolutionAdvanced (4th Generation)), cdmaOne (2G), CDMA2000 (3G) (Code divisionmultiple access 2000 (Third generation)), EV-DO (Evolution-DataOptimized or Evolution-Data Only), AMPS (1G) (Advanced Mobile PhoneSystem (1st Generation)), TACS/ETACS (Total Access CommunicationSystem/Extended Total Access Communication System), D-AMPS (2G) (DigitalAMPS (2nd Generation)), PTT (Push-to-talk), MTS (Mobile TelephoneSystem), IMTS (Improved Mobile Telephone System), AMTS (Advanced MobileTelephone System), OLT (Norwegian for Offentlig Landmobil Telefoni,Public Land Mobile Telephony), MTD (Swedish abbreviation forMobiltelefonisystem D, or Mobile telephony system D), Autotel/PALM(Public Automated Land Mobile), ARP (Finnish for Autoradiopuhelin, “carradio phone”), NMT (Nordic Mobile Telephony), Hicap (High capacityversion of NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone)), CDPD (Cellular DigitalPacket Data), Mobitex, DataTAC, iDEN (Integrated Digital EnhancedNetwork), PDC (Personal Digital Cellular), PHS (Personal Handy-phoneSystem), WIDEN (Wideband Integrated Digital Enhanced Network), iBurst,and Unlicensed Mobile Access (UMA, also referred to as 3GPP GenericAccess Network, or GAN standard)).

In various embodiments, the data may be transmitted using at least oneof unicast, multicast and broadcast.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be different.

In various embodiments, the first radio access technology and the secondradio access technology may be identical.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bemultiple description codecs, as will be explained in more detail below.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may bevideo codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beaudio codecs.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the first data to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the second data to obtain thecontent.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode a combination of the first dataand second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the first codec and the second codec may beconfigured so that a decoder can decode the first data to obtain thecontent; where the first codec and the second codec may be furtherconfigured so that the same decoder can decode the second data to obtainthe content; and wherein the first codec and the second codec may befurther configured so that the same decoder can decode a combination ofthe first data and second data to obtain the content.

In various embodiments, the quality of the decoded content may be higherwhen it is decoded from the combined first data and second data comparedto when it is decoded from the first data alone or when it is decodedfrom the second data alone.

In various embodiments, information representing a position of a radiocommunication device may be received.

In various embodiments, it may be determined whether a pre-determinedcell is available for the radio communication device based on thereceived position information. According to various embodiments, themost suitable combination of Radio Access technologies may bedetermined, for example such that the overall power consumption isminimized in the UE, or that the subscription cost for the user isminimized.

According to various embodiments, the most used Radio AccessTechnologies (RAT) in a given area may be analyzed, a number ofredundant flows (for example a number of redundant data) may be createdand broadcasted following the level of RAT acceptance by the users in agiven area.

In various embodiments, coding parameters for at least one of the firstcodec and the second codec may be determined, based on the determinationwhether a pre-determined cell is available for the radio communicationdevice.

In various embodiments, information indicating whether a pre-determinedcell is available for a radio communication device may be received.

In various embodiments, coding parameters for at least one of the firstcodec and the second codec may be determined, based on the receivedinformation indicating whether a pre-determined cell is available forthe radio communication device.

In various embodiments, a request for transmission of further datarepresenting the content encoded using a further codec using a furthercell may be received from a radio communication device.

In various embodiments, information representing the required quality ofservice of the content for a radio communication device may be received.

In various embodiments, coding parameters for at least one of the firstcodec and the second codec may be determined, based on the receivedinformation representing the required quality of service.

In various embodiments, it may be determined whether a bearer for apre-determined cell is available.

In various embodiments, coding parameters for at least one of the firstcodec and the second codec may be deter tined, based on thedetermination whether a bearer for a pre-determined cell is available.

In various embodiments, the data may be generated by encoding thecontent.

In various embodiments, data representing the content encoded using acodec may be stored, and the data may be generated by retrieving datafrom the storage.

FIG. 8 shows an information provider 800 in accordance with anembodiment. The information provider 800 may include a storage 802configured to store a plurality of files, each file representing thesame content; and a plurality of transmitters 804 configured to transmitthe plurality of files, each file using one of a plurality of radioaccess technologies. The storage 802 and the plurality of transmitters804 may be coupled with each other, e.g. via an electrical connection806 such as e.g. a cable or a computer bus or via any other suitableelectrical connection to exchange electrical signals.

According to various embodiments, Multicast/Broadcast Services (MBS) forexample for the following conditions may be provided, as will beexplained below: the user may be assumed to be in a heavilyheterogeneous environment (for example, multiple Radio AccessTechnologies (RATs) may be accessible in a given geographic area), andthe user may be able to operate multiple RATs simultaneously, forexample the user may be equipped with a terminal that supports thesimultaneous operation of 3GPP LTE and WiFi.

According to various embodiments, the user may exploit an instantaneousRAT context such that it may receive an instantaneous optimum QoS(Quality of Service). This QoS may vary greatly over time, in particularif the user is moving. The general principle will be illustrated withreference to the following figures.

FIG. 9 shows an area 900, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice (HBMS) in accordance with an embodiment, is provided. Forexample, a user as illustrated in FIG. 9 accessing a video service, mayhave at a first time only a link to the nearest eNB.

The area 900 may be the area 100 of FIG. 1, wherein the UE 142 mayreceive data only from the sixth standard eNB 124 in the sixth 3GPP LTEmacro-cell 122, as indicated by ellipse 902. For example, the UE 142 maybe located at the cell edge of the sixth cell 122. As a result, the UEmay obtain only low quality of service at the cell edge and the qualityof a video service may be low, as indicated by a poor quality image 904.

FIG. 10 shows an area 1000, in which a heterogeneous broadcast/multicastservice in accordance with an embodiment is provided. The area 1000 maybe similar to the area 100 of FIG. 1. The UE 142 may have moved toanother location on the road 146, and may now receive data from thethird standard eNB 112 in the third 3GPP LTE macro-cell 110 as indicatedby a first ellipse 1002, from the fifth standard eNB 120 in the fifth3GPP LTE macro-cell 122 as indicated by a second ellipse 1004, from thesixth standard eNB 124 in the sixth 3GPP LTE macro-cell 122, asindicated by third ellipse 1006 and from the WiFi base station 140 inthe WiFi cell 138 as indicated by being illustrated directly in the WiFicell 138. As a result, the UE may receive data from all of these cells,and may combine the data, to increase the quality of the received data.For example, the user may obtain good video quality of service bycombining the signals flows from the multiple sources, as indicated by agood quality image 1008.

For example, as soon as the user enters the WiFi coverage, the link tomultiple RATs may be established simultaneously (3×eNB, 1×WiFi), whichmay greatly improve the video quality.

According to various embodiments, a user may decode the original data byany combination of the streams provided by the source, as will beillustrated below.

FIG. 11 shows a diagram 1100 illustrating a plurality of data streams inaccordance with an embodiment.

According to various embodiments, any UE may combine any number ofavailable streams (for example, each stream may be transported on anyavailable RAT). A UE accessing streams transported by distinct RATs maydesire to operate the corresponding decoders/transceiverssimultaneously.

A network (NW) 1118 may be distributing various streams enabling UEs todecode the source data by building on any combination of these streams.Depending on the combined throughput provided by these streams, theservice quality may be high/low.

For example, a first stream 1120 may be provided to a first WiMAX cell1116 and to a first 3GPP LTE cell 1102 and a second 3GPP LTE cell 1104;a second stream 1120 may be provided to the second 3GPP LTE cell 1104; athird stream 1120 may be provided to a first WiFi cell 1106 of a firstprovider; a fourth stream 1120 may be provided to a second WiFi cell1108 of a first provider; a fifth stream 1120 may be provided to a firstWiFi cell 1110 of a second provider; a sixth stream 1120 may be providedto a second WiFi cell 1112 of a second provider; a seventh stream 1120may be provided to a second WiMAX cell 1114; and an eighth stream 1120may be provided to the first WiMAX cell 1116. A

For example, a first UE 1136 may receive the first stream 1120 from thefirst 3GPP LTE cell 1102, the second stream 1122 from the second 3GPPLTE cell 1104 and the eighth stream 1134 from the first WiMAX cell 1116;a second UE 1138 may receive the third stream 1124 from the first WiFicell 1106 of the first provider; a third UE 1140 may receive the fifthstream 1128 from the first WiFi cell 1110 of the second provider and thesixth stream 1130 from the second WiFi cell 112 of the second provider;and a fourth UE 1142 may receive the seventh stream 1132 from the secondWiMAX cell 1114. The fourth stream 1126 may be inactive, because no UEis receiving it.

According to various embodiments, methods and devices may be providedthat may provide the behavior of the UE accessing such heterogeneous MBSservices as illustrated above. According to various embodiments,modification on the network side may be provided to provide such abehavior.

According to various embodiments, methods and devices for the efficientdistribution of an identical source signal over various heterogeneousnodes applying distinct (redundant) encoding may be provided. Accordingto various embodiments, the inclusion of such a functionality intocellular systems, for example into 3GPP LTE, may be provided.

According to various embodiments, methods and devices on the SourceCoding and system management side may be provided for the heterogeneousMBS concept illustrated above.

According to various embodiments, on the system level, distinct (forexample redundant) versions of the same source data may be transmittedby various nodes. According to various embodiments, the efficientdistribution of an identical source signal over various heterogeneousnodes applying distinct (for example redundant) encoding may beprovided. According to various embodiments, the term ‘node’ may includevarious embodiments of base stations or access points that may be notco-located at the same site. According to various embodiments, in thecontext of LTE-Advanced, various devices and methods according tovarious embodiments may be applied to Carrier Aggregation methods.According to various embodiments, in Carrier Aggregation, a number ofnon-adjacent frequency bands may be used jointly to provide a UE withhigh data rate services, while said frequency bands may be used by thesame base station (in other words: the same node) in a well coordinatedmanner.

According to various embodiments, for source coding, the user may beable to exploit any combination of distinct redundant flows of the sameoriginal signal. According to various embodiments, a “MultipleDescription Coding (MDC)” approach may be applied to the codecs.

FIG. 12 shows a flow diagram 1200 illustrating basic network tasks forprovision of heterogeneous broadcast/multicast services in accordancewith an embodiment. According to various embodiments, for the provisionof heterogeneous MBS services, the following tasks may be repeatedlyperformed: in 1202, context acquisition may be performed, for examplethe UE positions may be identified; in 1204, infrastructure analysis maybe performed, for example, nodes covering a UE, for which the UE may beable to activate corresponding receivers, may be identified, for examplealso taking UE preferences into account; and in 1206, infrastructureselection may be performed, for example, most suitable nodes fortransmitting distinct redundant flows of the identical source signal maybe selected

According to various embodiments, the identification of position of theUE may be UE based (and network assisted) or network based (and UEassisted).

According to various embodiments, on UE-demand addition of heterogeneousMBS flows may be provided. According to various embodiments, anadditional heterogeneous MBS flow may be requested by UE devices. Forexample, if a UE arrives in the coverage area of a novel node which isnot contributing to the QoS of a given original signal, the user mayrequest the network to also distribute a corresponding (for exampleadditional redundant) flow over such a node. For example, upon receptionof the corresponding request from the UE, the network may decide uponthe usage of the proposed node. For example, if it will be added to thelist of distribution nodes of the heterogeneous MBS flows in the future,a corresponding indicator message may be distributed to all relevant UEdevices and the data rate may be adapted correspondingly (for exampletaking the capabilities of the concerned node into account, theirdistance to the node, and the like).

According to various embodiments, in order to include the heterogeneousMBS support in 3GPP LTE, the Core Network Architecture may be extended,as will be explained below.

FIG. 13 shows a network architecture 1300 in accordance with anembodiment. The network architecture 1300 may be a Non-Roaming 3GPP CoreNetwork Architecture with three different Radio Access Networks (RANs).The 3GPP Network Architecture 1300 may include an Evolved Packet Core(EPC) and a General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) Core, which may beconnected with each other by various interfaces, as will be described inmore detail below. As shown in FIG. 13, the GPRS Core may include aServing GPRS Support Node (SGSN) 1304, which may be coupled to differentRadio Access Networks, such as e.g. to a GSM EDGE Radio Access Network(GERAN) 1308 (which may also be referred to as 2G or 2.5G) via a Gbinterface, and/or to a UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN)1312 via an Iu interface. In an embodiment, UTRAN may stand for UMTSTerrestrial Radio Access Network and may be a collective ten for theNodeBs and Radio Network Controllers (RNCs) which make up the UMTS radioaccess network. This communications network, commonly referred to as 3G,may carry many traffic types from real-time Circuit Switched to IP basedPacket Switched. The UTRAN 1312 may include at least one NodeB that maybe connected to at least one Radio Network Controller (RNC). An RNC mayprovide control functionalities for one or more NodeB(s). A NodeB and anRNC may be the same device, although typical implementations may have aseparate RNC located in a central location serving multiple NodeBs. AnRNC together with its corresponding NodeBs may be called the RadioNetwork Subsystem (RNS). There may be more than one RNS provided perUTRAN.

Furthermore, in an embodiment, the following entities or components maybe provided in the general 3GPP Network Architecture 1300:

-   -   an evolved UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (E-UTRAN) 1316;    -   a trusted non-3GPP Internet Protocol (IP) access network and        connected therewith trusted non-3GPP Internet Protocol (IP)        devices, in other words, trusted non-3GPP devices which may        access the EPC using the Internet Protocol stack;    -   a Wireless Local Area network (WLAN) 3GPP Internet Protocol (IP)        access network and connected therewith Wireless Local Area        network (WLAN) 3GPP Internet Protocol (IP) devices, in other        words, WLAN 3GPP devices which may access the EPC using the        Internet Protocol stack;    -   a Home Subscriber Server (HSS) 1322; and    -   a Policy and Charging Rules Function (PCRF) entity 1324.

E-UTRAN may be understood as being the new 3GPP Radio Access Network forLTE (3.9G) that is currently being worked on. The proposed E-UTRA airinterface may use OFDMA for the downlink transmission direction (towerto handset) and Single Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) for the uplinktransmission direction (handset to tower). It may employ MIMO(Multiple-Input Multiple-Output) with a plurality of antennas, e.g. withup to four antennas per station. The use of OFDM (Orthogonal FrequencyDivision Multiplexing) may enable E-UTRA to be much more flexible in itsuse of spectrum than the older CDMA based systems, such as e.g. UTRAN.OFDM may have a link spectral efficiency greater than CDMA, and whencombined with modulation formats such as 64QAM (Quadrature AmplitudeModulation), and techniques as MIMO, E-UTRA may be more efficient thanW-CDMA (Wideband CDMA) with HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access)and HSUPA (High Speed Uplink Packet Access).

Furthermore, as will be described in more detail below, the EPC mayinclude a Mobility Management Entity (MME) 1318 and a Serving Gateway(S-GW) 1330 (in FIG. 13 shown as separate devices, however, the MME 1318and the S-GW 1330 may also be implemented in one combined entity), a3GPP Anchor entity and an SAE (System Architecture Evolution) Anchorentity.

In an embodiment, the E-UTRAN 1316 may be connected to the ServingGateway 1330 via an S1-U interface 1314. In an embodiment, the E-UTRAN1316 may be connected to the MME 1318 via an S1-MME interface 1310.

In an embodiment, a UE 1302 may be connected to the E-UTRAN 1316 by anLTE-Uu interface 1306.

Furthermore, the trusted non-3GPP IP entity may be connected to the SAEAnchor entity via an S2a interface. In an embodiment, the S2a interfacemay be based on the Proxy Mobile IPv6 (PMIP) and in order to supportaccesses that do not support PMIP also Mobile IPv4.

The WLAN entity may include an ePDG (Evolved Packet Data Gateway) and aWLAN access network. The ePDG may be connected to the SAE Anchor entityvia an S2b interface, which may provide the user plane with relatedcontrol and mobility support between ePDG and a Packet Data Network(PDN) Gateway 1334 of the EPC. In an embodiment, the S2b interface maybe based on the Proxy Mobile IPv6 (PMIP).

Furthermore, the SGSN 1304 may be connected to the MME 1318 in the EPCvia an S3 interface 1342, which may provide and enable a user and bearerinformation exchange for inter 3GPP access network mobility in idleand/or active state. In an embodiment, the S3 interface 1342 may bebased on the GPRS tunneling protocol (GTP) and the Gn interface as itmay be provided between SGSNs. The SGSN 1304 may further be connected tothe 3GPP Anchor entity via an S4 interface, which may provide the userplane with related control and mobility support between the GPRS Coreand the 3GPP Anchor function of the S-GW 1330 and may be based on theGTP protocol and the Gn reference point as provided between SGSN 1304and GGSN (GPRS Support Node).

The MME S-GW may be connected to the 3GPP Anchor entity via an S5ainterface and the 3GPP Anchor entity may be connected to the SAE Anchorentity via an S5b interface.

Furthermore, the HSS 1322 may be connected to the MME 1318 via an S6ainterface 1350, which may provide or enable transfer of subscription andauthentication data for authenticating/authorizing user access to theevolved system (AAA interface) between the MME 1318 and the HSS 1322.

The PCRF 1324 may be connected to the EPC via an S7 interface, which mayprovide transfer of Quality of Service (QoS) policy and charging rulesfrom the PCRF 1324 to the Policy and Charging Enforcement Function(PCEF) in an PDN Gateway 1334 of the EPC. In an embodiment, the S7interface may be based on an Gx interface 1338.

IP services 1354 such as e.g. (3G) IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS), (3G)Packet Switches Streaming (PSS), etc., may be provided via an SGiinterface 1356 to the SAE Anchor entity and/or via an Rx interface 1358to the PCRF 1324. In an embodiment, the SGi interface 1356 may be theinterface between the PDN Gateway 1334 and the packet data network. Thepacket data network may be an operator external public or private packetdata network or an intra operator packet data network, e.g. forprovision of IP services such as e.g. of IMS. The SGi interface 1356 maycorrespond to the Gi and Wi interfaces and support any 3GPP or non-3GPPaccess. The Rx interface 1358 may be the interface between the IPservices and the PCRF 1324.

In various embodiments, the MME may be connected to other MMES by an S10interface 1320 for MME relocation and MME to MME information transfer.

In various embodiments, the MME 1318 may be connected to the ServingGateway 1330 by an S11 interface 1326.

In various embodiments, the Serving Gateway 1330 may be connected to thePDN gateway 1334 by an S5 interface 1332. In various embodiments, theServing Gateway 1330 may be connected to the SGSN 1304 by an S4interface 1344. In various embodiments, the Serving Gateway 1330 may beconnected to the UTRAN 1312 by an S12 interface 1328.

In various embodiments, the Serving Gateway (SGW) 1330 and the PDNGateway (PGW) 1334 may be one functional entity, as indicated by dashedbox 1336.

According to various embodiments, the EPC may include as itssubcomponents the MME 1318, the SOW 1330, and the PGW 1334.

According to various embodiments, the MME (Mobility Management Entity)1318 may be the key control-node for the LTE access-network. It may beresponsible for idle mode UE tracking and paging procedure includingretransmissions. It may be involved in the beareractivation/deactivation process and may also be responsible for choosingthe SOW 1330 for a UE 1302 at the initial attach and at time ofintra-LTE handover involving Core Network (CN) node relocation. It maybe responsible for authenticating the user (by interacting with the HomeSubscriber Server (HSS 1322)). The Non-Access Stratum (NAS) signalingmay terminate at the MME 1318 and it may also be responsible forgeneration and allocation of temporary identities to UEs. It may checkthe authorization of the UE to camp on the service provider's PublicLand Mobile Network (PLMN) and may enforce UE roaming restrictions. TheMME 1318 may be the termination point in the network forciphering/integrity protection for NAS signaling and may handle thesecurity key management. Lawful interception of signaling may also besupported by the MME 1318. The MME 1318 also may provide the controlplane function for mobility between LTE and 3GPP technologies with theS3 interface 1342 terminating at the MME 1318 from the SGSN 1304. TheMME 1318 may terminate the S6a interface 1350 towards the home HSS 1322for roaming UEs.

The SGW (Serving Gateway) 1330 may route and forward user data packets,while also acting as the mobility anchor for the user plane duringinter-eNodeB handovers and as the anchor for mobility between LTE andother 3GPP technologies (for example terminating S4 interface 1344 andrelaying the traffic between 2G/3G systems and PGW 1334). For idle stateUEs, the SGW 1330 may terminate the DL (downlink) data path and maytrigger paging when DL data arrives for the UE. It may manage and storeUE contexts, for example parameters of the IP bearer service, networkinternal routing information. It may also perform replication of theuser traffic in case of lawful interception.

According to various embodiments, the PGW (PDN Gateway) 1334 may provideconnectivity from the UE 1302 to external packet data networks by beingthe point of exit and entry of traffic for the UE 1302. A UE 1302 mayhave simultaneous connectivity with more than one PGW 1334 for accessingmultiple PDNs. The PGW 1334 may perform policy enforcement, packetfiltering for each user, charging support, lawful Interception andpacket screening. The PGW may further act as the anchor for mobilitybetween 3GPP and non-3GPP technologies such as WiMAX and 3GPP2 (CDMA 1×and EvDO (Evolution-Data Optimized)).

FIG. 14 shows a network architecture 1400 in accordance with anembodiment. Various parts of the network architecture 1400 may be thesame as or similar to the parts of the network architecture 1300 of FIG.13, and the same reference signs may be used for those parts andduplicate description may be omitted.

In the network architecture 1400, three different RANs (Radio AccessNetworks; for example UTRAN 1312, GERAN 1308, and E-UTRAN 1316), a MNO's(Mobile Network Operator) core network and the SGi interface 1356connecting the MNO's domain 1402 to the Internet 1404 (which may also bereferred to as IP cloud), as indicated by a dashed line 1406, are shown.

According to various embodiments, a new entity 1408 may be provided. Thenew entity 1408 may analyze and adapt (for example transcode) theu-plane (user plane) data stream according to the needs and/orcapabilities of the RATs in the various RANs, as will be explained inmore detail below.

According to various embodiments, an encoder control 1410 (for examplean encoder controller 1410 or an encoder control entity 1410, forexample a u-plane encoder 1410) may be provided. The encoder control1410 may be assigned to the source encoding engine residing somewhere inthe IP cloud 1404. It may not be present in all cases; for example itmay not be present when the u-plane data is already encoded and storedon a server outside the MNO's domain. However, it may be present, whenthe encoding of data is an ongoing process at the time the data isconsumed by the UE 1302 (for example in the streaming case).

According to various embodiments, the new entity 1408 and/or the encodercontrol 1410 may be (or may be a part of) the information provider ashas been explained above.

According to various embodiments, various transactions as will beexplained below may be provided between the New Entity 1408 and theServing Gateway 1336/PDN Gateway 1334 functional entity 1336, andbetween the New Entity 1408 and the Encoder Control functional module1410 at the source (for example in the Internet 1404).

According to various embodiments, in a first transaction, as indicatedby a first arrow 1412, the New Entity 1408 may receive QoS relatedinformation about (for example currently active or theoreticallypossible) bearer configurations in E-UTRAN 1316, UTRAN 1312, and GERAN1308.

According to various embodiments, in a second transaction, as indicatedby a second arrow 1414, the New Entity 1408 may request pre-determinedbearer configurations for a number of different bearers in various RATs,such as E-UTRAN 1316, UTRAN 1312, and GERAN 1308. According to variousembodiments, this request may be based on a u-plane coding analysis doneby the New Entity 1408 itself, and/or on information received from theu-plane encoder (residing outside of the MNO's domain).

According to various embodiments, in a third transaction, as indicatedby a third arrow 1416, the New Entity 1408 may request a pre-determinedcoding scheme from the u-plane encoder or from the Encoder Controlentity 1410 assigned to the u-plane encoder. According to variousembodiments, this request may be based on various pieces of QoS relatedinformation received from the P-GW (PDN Gateway) 1334/S-GW (ServingGateway) 1330 pertaining to a number of (currently active ortheoretically possible) bearer configurations in various RATs, such asE-UTRAN 1316, UTRAN 1312, and GERAN 1308 or pertaining to a number ofdifferent Component Carriers (in case of LTE-Advanced).

According to various embodiments, in a fourth transaction, as indicatedby a fourth arrow 1418, the New Entity 1408 may receive encodinginformation from the u-plane encoder or the Encoder Control entity 1410assigned to the u-plane encoder.

FIG. 15 shows a network architecture 1500 in accordance with anembodiment. Various parts of the network architecture 1500 may be thesame as or similar to the parts of the network architecture 1400 of FIG.14, and the same reference signs may be used for those parts andduplicate description may be omitted. In FIG. 15, the EPC (EvolvedPacket Core) is shown as a box 1502 with its three main sub componentsMME 1318, SOW 1330, and PGW 1334.

FIG. 16 shows a network architecture 1600 in accordance with anembodiment. Various parts of the network architecture 1600 may be thesame as or similar to the parts of the network architecture 1500 of FIG.15, and the same reference signs may be used for those parts andduplicate description may be omitted. In FIG. 16, a simplifiedarchitecture of the non-roaming 3GPP Core Network Architecture inaccordance with an embodiment is depicted, wherein the EPC 1602 is shownas one block. The S1-MME interface and the S1-U interface are shown asone combined S1 interface 1604.

FIG. 17 shows a network architecture 1700 in accordance with anembodiment. Various parts of the network architecture 1700 may be thesame as or similar to the parts of the network architecture 1600 of FIG.16, and the same reference signs may be used for those parts andduplicate description may be omitted.

By way of example, the internal architecture (for example the buildingblocks) of the New Entity 1408 in the MNO's core network 1402 is shown.

According to various embodiments, the New Entity 1408 may include aTranscoding Engine 1704 in order to support transcoding of u-plane data,for example to turn a continuous flow of ‘normal’ real time streamingdata into two or more flows encoded according to the principles ofMultiple Description Coding (MDC) for distribution via distinct nodes(for example including different RATs) or via distinct ComponentCarriers in case of LTE-Advanced.

According to various embodiments, the New Entity 1408 may include au-plane data and codec analyzer 1702. The u-plane data and codecanalyzer 1702 may be provided to find out details, for example encodingdetails, about the u-plane data received from the source in theInternet.

According to various embodiments, the New Entity 1408 may be equippedwith some query and control routines, for example one for the corenetwork/RAN side, and one for the data sources in the Internet, as willbe explained in more detail below.

According to various embodiments, the new entity 1408 may include aRAT/Bearer Capability Query Routine 1706 which may request nodecapabilities and theoretically possible configurations for a number ofdifferent bearers in various RATs, such as E-UTRAN 1316, UTRAN 1312, andGERAN 1308. The response to this query may be sent back to the NewEntity 1408 by means of the first transaction as described above.

According to various embodiments, the new entity 1408 may include aRAT/Bearer Control Routine 1710 which may configure the differentbearers in various RATs, such as E-UTRAN 1316, UTRAN 1312, and GERAN1308. This message may be similar to the second transaction describedabove. For example, in case of LTE-Advanced, this message may includeconfiguration information for the distinct Component Carriers.

According to various embodiments, the new entity 1408 may include anEncoder Capability Query Routine 1708 which may request capabilitiesfrom the Encoder Control entity which may be assigned either to a sourceserver and/or an encoding engine. The response to this query may be sentback to the New Entity 1408 for example using the fourth transactiondescribed above and may include information about re-configurationoptions related to Multiple Description Coding (MDC) and alike.

According to various embodiments, the new entity 1408 may include anEncoder Control Routine 1712 which may configure the source serverand/or the encoding engine. This message may be similar to the thirdtransaction described above.

According to various embodiments, a plurality of different radio accessnetworks may be provided, as indicated by region 1714. For example, aGERAN 1308 may be provided for GSM 1716. For example, a UTRAN 1312 maybe provided for UMTS 1718. For example, an E-UTRAN 1316 may be providedfor LTE 1720. For example, a further RAN 1724 may be provided foranother technology 1722. For example, further RAN 1728 may be providedfor further technologies 1726. For example, a WLAN 1730 access point maybe provided.

FIG. 18 shows a network architecture 1800 in accordance with anembodiment. Various parts of the network architecture 1800 may be thesame as or similar to the parts of the network architecture 1700 of FIG.17, and the same reference signs may be used for those parts andduplicate description may be omitted.

According to various embodiments, two New Entities may be provided. Forexample, a first new entity 1408 ₁ may reside in the MNO's core network1402, and a second new entity 1408 ₂ may reside in the Internet 1404outside the MNO's domain.

According to various embodiments, a functionality split may be provided.For example, functions (for example all functions) that are related toRAT capabilities, bearer configuration and (for LTE-Advanced) ComponentCarriers may be executed by the first New Entity 1408 ₁ inside the MNO'score network 1402. According to various embodiments, functions (forexample all functions) pertaining to encoder issues may be executed bythe second New Entity 1408 ₂ in the Internet 1404. For example, for theexchange of information between the first new entity 1408 ₁ and thesecond new entity 1408 ₂ a new interface IFnew 1802 may be provided.Alternatively the first new entity 1408 ₁ and the second new entity 1408₂ may talk with each other over a modified SGi interface.

According to various embodiments, the first new entity 1408 ₁ mayinclude a first u-plane data and codec analyzer 1702 ₁ (which may besimilar to the u-plane data and codec analyzer 1702 of the new entity1408 shown in FIG. 17), and a first transcoding engine 1704 ₁ (which maybe similar to the transcoding engine 1704 of the new entity 1408 shownin FIG. 17).

According to various embodiments, the second new entity 1408 ₂ mayinclude a second u-plane data and codec analyzer 1702 ₂ (which may besimilar to the u-plane data and codec analyzer 1702 of the new entity1408 shown in FIG. 17), and a second transcoding engine 1704 ₂ (whichmay be similar to the transcoding engine 1704 of the new entity 1408shown in FIG. 17).

According to various embodiments, both the functional entities of theu-plane data and codec analyzer and of the transcoding engine may beplaced (for example in entirety or for example in parts) either in thefirst New Entity 1408 ₁ or in the second New Entity 1408 ₂. According tovarious embodiments, it may be desired to keep all information about RATcapabilities, bearer configuration and (for LTE-Advanced) ComponentCarriers inside the MNO's core network 1402 and to do the finalconfiguration decisions there, too. It may be therefore desired that theu-plane data and codec analyzer and the transcoding engine solely residein the MNO's core network 1402, i.e. in first New Entity 1408 ₁ ratherthan in the second New Entity 1408 ₂.

According to various embodiments, a RAT may be an LTE RAT, which may bebased on a 3GPP standard.

FIG. 19 shows a control-plane protocol stack 1900 in accordance with anembodiment. By way of example, a control plane protocol stack 1900 ofthe LTE air interface 1910 between a UE 1906 on the UE side 1902 and aneNB 1908 (which may be provided in an E-UTRAN) and a MME 1910 (which maybe provided in an EPC) on the network side 1904 are shown. An S1interface 1912 may be provided between the eNB 1908 and the MME 1910.

According to various embodiments, in LTE, a Radio Resource Control (RRC)protocol may be terminated in eNB on the network side, as indicated byblock 1918. The RRC protocol may perform (among other things):

-   -   System Information Broadcast;    -   Paging;    -   RRC connection management;    -   Radio bearer control;    -   Mobility functions; and    -   UE measurement reporting and control.

According to various embodiments, a Non Access Stratum (NAS) controlprotocol may be terminated in the MME 1910 on the network side 1904 asindicated by block 1916. The NAS control protocol may perform (amongother things):

-   -   EPS bearer management;    -   Authentication;    -   ECM-IDLE mobility handling;    -   Paging origination in ECM-IDLE; and    -   Security control.

According to various embodiments, for the enquiries of the RAT/BearerCapability Query Routine and the commands of the RAT/Bearer ControlRoutine described above, some of the RRC and NAS functions listed abovemay be of relevance; these may be

-   -   RRC connection management (RRC);    -   Radio bearer control (RRC); and    -   EPS bearer management (NAS).

According to various embodiments, information about eNB relatedcapabilities may be requested from the RAT/Bearer Capability QueryRoutine or commands with eNB related configuration instructions may besent from the RAT/Bearer Control Routine, and then the informationexchange may go via the S1 Interface, because in LTE the RRC protocolmay terminate in the eNB. According to various embodiments, timeinvariant pieces of information (about connection management and bearercontrol) may be stored in the MME.

According to various embodiments, the NAS control protocol may terminatein the UE, as indicated by block 1914. According to various embodiments,the RRC protocol may terminate in the UE, as indicated by block 1916.

According to various embodiment, a Packet Data Convergence Protocol(PDCP) may terminate in the UE, as indicated by block 1920, and in theeNB as indicated by block 1922.

According to various embodiment, a Radio Link Control (RLC) mayterminate in the UE, as indicated by block 1924, and in the eNB asindicated by block 1926.

According to various embodiment, a Medium Access Control (MAC) protocolmay terminate in the UE, as indicated by block 1928, and in the eNB asindicated by block 1930.

According to various embodiment, a Physical (PHY) control protocol mayterminate in the UE, as indicated by block 1932, and in the eNB asindicated by block 1934.

According to various embodiments, other Radio Access Networks (RANs),such as the ‘UTRAN’ of UMTS with its concept of Radio NetworkControllers (RNCs), may be different in this respect. In UMTS the RRCprotocol layer may terminate in the RNC rather than in the NodeB.

According to various embodiments, mobile radio communication accordingto IMT-Advanced (International Mobile Telecommunications Advanced) maybe provided.

According to various embodiments, a heterogeneous MBS(multicast/broadcast service) may be provided. According to variousembodiments, redundant data flows with data rates adapted to the usedRATs may be suitably selected. For example, higher data rates may beprovided by short-range systems such as WiFi, ZigBee, etc., while mediumdata rates may be provided by wide area systems such as Cellular systems

According to various embodiments, a RAT and/or a radio bearer may beselected. According to various embodiments, their respectivecharacteristics may influence the encoding of data, for example whenMultiple Description Coding (MDC) is deployed at the source.

According to various embodiments, codec characteristics and/orrequirements may influence the RAT selection, bearer configuration, andComponent Carrier (de)activation.

According to various embodiments, mechanisms may be provided forsuitable selection of codecs based on their characteristics and/orrequirements influencing the RAT selection, bearer configuration, andComponent Carrier (de)activation.

According to various embodiments, as has been illustrated above, usersmay receive multiple (redundant) flows of an identical source signalover various heterogeneous nodes. For example, a UE capable of operatingmultiple distinct RATs simultaneously may be enabled to exploit thesevarious streams in order to obtain always the best QoS which may beachieved by the full exploitation of a given radio context in a givengeographic area.

According to various embodiments, in the context of LTE-Advanced withCarrier Aggregation, a UE may receive multiple redundant flows of anidentical source signal via distinct Component Carriers, while everysingle flow may be adapted to the distinct Component Carrier'sindividual QoS characteristics.

According to various embodiments, the UE may be able to fully exploitthe heterogeneous radio context in order to obtain the good QoS at thelow cost (for example in terms of resource usage, power consumption,subscription cost, or the like).

According to various embodiments, the QoS perceived by the UE may be notinterrupted or may be less interrupted at some locations. Thecombination of a heterogeneous multitude of RATs may introduce a newlevel of diversity allowing for a continued level of QoS. According tovarious embodiments, if ever one RAT is suddenly not operational anymore, the data may be obtained through other neighboring RATs. Forexample, in the case of video services, this may allow to have a smoothand seamless continuation of the service even if any of the availablelinks break.

According to various embodiments, the operator may be able to betterexploit its available resources due to an optimized distribution ofhigh-data-rate services (for example video services) via other networksand by building on a diversity of technologies.

While the invention has been particularly shown and described withreference to specific embodiments, it should be understood by thoseskilled in the art that various changes in form and detail may be madetherein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention asdefined by the appended claims. The scope of the invention is thusindicated by the appended claims and all changes which come within themeaning and range of equivalency of the claims are therefore intended tobe embraced.

What is claimed is:
 1. A radio communication device, comprising: a first transceiver to receive from a first cell first data representing a content encoded using a first codec; a second transceiver to receive from a second cell second data representing the content encoded using a second codec; and one or more processors coupled to the first and second transceivers, the one or more processors to decode combined data of first and second streams to obtain the content, the first and second data streams associated with the first and second data, respectively, and from the first and second transceivers, respectively; and the one or more processors further to: determine whether receipt of the first data stream stops or receipt of the second data stream stops; and in response to a determination that receipt of one of the data streams stops, decode received data of the other one of the data streams to obtain the content.
 2. The radio communication device of claim 1, further comprising: an additional transceiver to receive from an additional cell additional data representing the content encoded using an additional codec.
 3. The radio communication device of claim 1, the one or more processors to determine the position of the radio communication device.
 4. The radio communication device of claim 1, the one or more processors to determine whether a predetermined cell is available.
 5. The radio communication device of claim 1, the one or more processors to request transmission of additional data representing the content encoded using an additional codec from an information provider.
 6. The radio communication device of claim 1, the one or more processors to determine a quality of service corresponding to the content.
 7. The radio communication device of claim 1, wherein the cells are of different radio access networks (RANs).
 8. A method, comprising: receiving from a first cell first data representing a content encoded using a first codec, the first data received by a first transceiver; receiving from a second cell second data representing the content encoded using a second codec, the second data received by a second transceiver; and determining whether receipt of a first data stream stops or receipt of a second data stream stops, the first and second data streams associated with the first and second data, respectively, and from the first and second transceivers, respectively; and in response to determining that receipt of one of the data streams stops, decode received data of the other one of the data streams to obtain the content; and otherwise, decoding combined data of the first and second streams to obtain the content.
 9. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining whether a predetermined cell is available for a radio communication device of the first and second transceivers.
 10. The method of claim 8, further comprising: requesting transmission of additional data representing the content encoded using an additional codec.
 11. The method of claim 8, further comprising: determining a quality of service of the content.
 12. The method of claim 8, wherein the cells are of different radio access networks (RANs).
 13. The method of claim 12, wherein the different radio access networks (RANs) are of a heterogeneous multicast/broadcast service (MBS).
 14. An apparatus, comprising: a memory having logic; and processor circuitry coupled with the memory to execute the logic to: determine whether receipt of a first data stream stops or receipt of a second data stream stops; wherein the first stream corresponds to first data received from a first cell, the first data representing content encoded using a first codec, wherein the second stream corresponds to second data received from a second cell, the second data representing the content encoded using a second codec; and decode information to obtain the content, the information to include received data of one of the data streams if the receipt of the other one of the data streams stops or the information to include combined data of the first and second streams.
 15. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor circuitry is further to determine whether a predetermined cell is available for a radio communication device.
 16. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor circuitry is further to determine a position of a radio communication device.
 17. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor circuitry is further to request transmission of additional data representing the content encoded using an additional codec from an information provider.
 18. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the processor circuitry is further to determine a quality of service corresponding to the content.
 19. The apparatus of claim 14, wherein the cells are of different radio access networks (RANs). 